LOS ANGELES, CA. – September 27, 2012…. Marking an expanded commitment to some of its most important franchises, Twentieth Century Fox has brought on comics superstar Mark Millar to serve as a creative consultant on the studio’s upcoming projects based on Marvel Comics properties.

Millar wrote several celebrated Marvel books such as The Ultimates, Civil War and Wolverine: Old Man Logan, before moving on to found Millarworld (millarworld.tv), where he continues to develop existing film franchise titles Wanted and Kick-Ass, as well as newer comic properties The Secret Service, Superior, and Nemesis — the latter also in development at Fox. Millar will work with Fox on developing new avenues for its “X-Men” and “Fantastic Four” tentpoles.

Commented TCF production president Emma Watts: “We are excited to be working with Mark. In addition to his groundbreaking Marvel work, he is simply one of the most original voices in comics today and will be an invaluable resource to us and to our filmmakers as we look for fresh opportunities to innovate within our shared Marvel universe.”

Upcoming for the studio is THE WOLVERINE, starring Hugh Jackman, directed by James Mangold; X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST, helmed by Matthew Vaughn; and a reboot of “FANTASTIC FOUR, to be directed by Josh Trank (Chronicle).

“As someone who has spent his entire life obsessed with both comic-books and movies, this is essentially my dream gig as it’s a unique combination of both,” stated Millar. “I spent ten years working at Marvel and am really happy with the work I did on the comic side of things so the idea of working with these characters now in a brand new medium is enormously exciting for me. I really like the Fox team, love this bold new direction they have for their franchises and am proud to be working alongside some of modern cinema’s biggest talents. James Mangold is incredible, Matthew Vaughn’s one of my closest pals and Josh Trank gave us, in my opinion, one of the greatest superhero movies of the last decade with Chronicle. The invitation to join this crew was maybe the coolest phone-call I’ve ever had.”

Alan Moore puts his fit in his mouth a lot as well, plus he gets super uptight about his comic properties being adjusted for films. Not sure I care how up tight he is.

What I do care about is that the wanted movie bore very little reflection to the wanted comic (aside from being the son of a villian) and the tone and outcome was entirely different and I wonder how Millar’s input was.

And what has Millar done MOVIE wise to say this is a good deal?

This whole splitting of the Marvel Universe between studios is awful, imagine how much more FOX & SONY could do if they removed their heads from their arses and thought about some sort of Marvel Universe Partnership with Marvel itself – the possibilities to expand the Marvel Universe are exponential – a few movies a year in the marvel universe – who wouldn’t love that?

However, in the end, it’s still better than Warners consistent mis-steps handling the majority of their DC properties (still think firing Whedon was a good idea morons?)

bounder@beauchamp35@gmail.com • on Sep 27, 2012 11:46 am

Hope Fox likes getting their dirty laundry “anonymously” leaked to the nerd press every time Millar has a grumpy notes call!

cindercity12 • on Sep 27, 2012 11:46 am

You know what’s interesting? Mark Millar, as the article states, created the Ultimates for Marvel. And a lot of the ideas he developed in that comic make up the backbone of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

He created the Samuel L. Jackson based Nick Fury. Nick Fury and SHIELD being behind the creation of the Avengers. The Hulk being created due to attempts to recreate the Super Soldier serum. Hawkeye and Black Widow being black ops SHIELD agents and partners before being placed on the Avengers team. Thor’s costume. Cap’s WWII costume. The whole concept of the world being more realistic and science-based.

And now he’ll be working on Fox’s Marvel movies. This is interesting, because he was the original writer of Ultimate X-Men and also wrote Ultimate Fantastic Four.

So he is actually influencing almost all of the Marvel films, save for Spider-Man and Ghost Rider.

Cuppajoe • on Sep 27, 2012 11:46 am

Wow, they are really taking their Marvel properties seriously now that Rothman’s gone. My guess is that they tried to bring in Millar once before but Rothman was like “what for?”

JJ • on Sep 27, 2012 11:46 am

Who cares if he puts his foot in his mouth because it’s what he puts from his mind to the page or to an artist to visualize that matters. This is the man who helped shape Marvel’s Ultimate Universe which is essentially what Hollywood studios want to achieve with comic properties…a modern, big screen translation, taking the best parts of the comics and keep the best parts of their history for a streamlined quality movie.

FOX has floundered in the past with the random choices for their Marvel Properties: the inexperienced and ill suited writer/director Mark Steven Johnson for Daredevil, the lack of buzz and a sequel over Daredevil but then hiring Johnson AGAIN for Ghost Rider, the even worse choice of director for Fantastic Four along with the poorly cast Alba (she got the invisible part down part because she can’t act and barely registered as being in the film), Chiklis (good in theory, dull on screen) and the poorly conceived Dr. Doom (Dr. I Shoot Lighting Bolts is more like it) and also poorly cast Julian McMahon (good actor, wrong for the role that wasn’t much of a character to begin with).

Why Warner Bros./DC isn’t doing some kind of orchestration with it enormous catalog of characters is beyond me. The fumbling of Green Lantern and complete misfire of Bryan Singer on ‘Superman Returns’ should’ve given them the kick in the pants to make a move like this.

I would prefer that FOX not hold the X—Men license and it would revert back to Marvel but if Days of Future Past is good I’ll be happy.

Mark is a great choice and I look forward to more/exciting info.

John_M • on Sep 27, 2012 11:46 am

So much for Fantastic Four going back to Marvel Studios… ugh.

Myth based on baseless speculation, probably was going to be a few characters (think galactus/silver surfer for guardians of the galaxy) but if Marvel gets Daredevil back instead, I’ll be thrilled, would much rather get Daredevil in the universe.

The FF movies didn’t suffer only because of Alba, Gruffurd was awful (though at the same time, the terrible allowed for Evans to be Captain America, which is good) but the STORY sucked (yeah yeah yeah). Bad scripts make bad movies, and marvel seems to be the only movie studio hiring quality people to write the scripts of their comic book movies (Nolans batman are great ‘movies’ however they aren’t batman to anyone who actually knows batman mythology)

MattyJ • on Sep 27, 2012 11:46 am

Fox’s rights to Daredevil were about to expire October this year, but Marvel was willing to give them more time in exchange for Silver Surfer & Galactus (not Fantastic Four themselves). Had Fox not started production on a FF movie by 2014, then all of FF would’ve gone back to Marvel. So instead, Fox ditched Daredevil and opted for FF. It’s just a bummer IMO because FF and the Avengers won’t cross over any time soon (unless Fox wants to play nice and sign some contracts with Marvel to get the FF in the MCU)…

Anonymous • on Sep 27, 2012 11:46 am

“Nolans batman are great ‘movies’ however they aren’t batman to anyone who actually knows batman mythology”

Oh, you mean the “mythology” that is constantly redefined by subsequent generations of writers? You mean that ONE AND SINGLE “mythology”?

100stones3x • on Sep 27, 2012 11:46 am

Agree the story was awful. Read an earlier draft of the script that was actually pretty cool. Then they brought in Sam Hamm to rewrite and it became pure cliche. Maybe they’ll go more with the ULTIMATE feel for this time out.

The Watcher • on Sep 27, 2012 11:46 am

Spider-Man needs to go back to Marvel. Let’s work on that first, and then we can get the Fox properties back next. No extended partnerships -too many cooks spoiling the broth.

rocketeuropa • on Sep 27, 2012 11:46 am

You’ve GOT to be kidding!! Millar was the originator of “Ultimates”- the “better idea” of Marvel. Ha!! More like the death of the ideas that Lee and Kirby put forth.
Millar is the absolute antisisis of what Marvel was built on. His only goal is to build a career on re-writing Marvel history instead of building on it.
The absolute worse decision ANYONE could ever make!